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A show honoring the work of the "social practice" duo begins in July

By

Carol Kino

June 20, 2014 3:29 p.m. ET

For a single decade starting in 1985, Kate Ericson and Mel Ziegler were ardent pioneers of the art now known as "social practice." Based in New York City, and partners in life and in work, they specialized in interactive projects that shone the spotlight on community participants, in contrast to the market-dominated art of the era. In 1986, they collected broken gardening tools from workers in New York's Central Park, transformed them into $100 artworks and donated a portion of the proceeds back to the park. Some years later, they created an American flag with jars of baby food labeled with phonetic spellings...